another Monday

Another week already!

We have decided to keep Badgers name Badger. We tossed around a few ideas and then I remembered a character called Badger from a children's book Wind in the Willows, so I thought that was appropriate. Then when I was looking it up I found out that Wales is going to kill a bunch of Badgers in the theory that it will reduce the incidence of Bovine TB. There was an article on it the UK Guardian online, and almost all the comments were anti Badger killing and of course I agree with them.

Back to the new goats;the other we have named Piper which is related to the book as well-Pan the Piper, but I didn't want to call him Pan. Pan is of course half man and half goat.

They were banded Thursday and we will bring them home soon.

Now there are 18 bucklings are on the Hill. Five went to slaughter and nine arrived from another farm. I met some of them today-well all of them, but didn't linger too long with them. One of the new grey ones tried to follow us back down the hill and started bawling....maaaa, maaa, ma-aaaaaaa!

Boss heard him all the way to the house and said," was that the little grey one?"

and I said, "yes."

She said, "he was babied at his last home, his name is "guapo" "

and P looked perplexed and I laughed and said that is "handsome" in Spanish, LOL.

The weather was warmer over the weekend-it was supposed to be teens yesterday and yet it broke freezing again. The weatherman is really not doing very well with his predictions. Friday they said we were going to miss a storm Sunday night and would get a dusting. We are now under a winter weather advisory and have about six inches of snow out there. I worked the farm this am and the roads were pretty crummy going and coming.

We are supposed to see the sun again on Thursday. :(

Friday

Well I am tired!

Here is a pic of some of the bucklings on the hill this week. There are 13 but not that many in the pic!



I have been going up ahead by myself to grain them and they keep a close eye on me- for when I try to sneak off to put the feeders down.

Only a few of them have names or nicknames from when my daughter, Willow, was helping out. The rest are known by their lineage, generally through the mother. The black in the front is Mary's Boy, who after an intense bout of nursing through a bad patch after weaning was named by P as "Joseph".

I can't tell which grey is in the front in the pic, we have "Alpaca head" (Nive's grey), "Tack Room baby" (Lilymore's grey) "Chubs" (Lois's grey) and lastly, "Sugreca's", who has no nickname yet.

Bonnie's boy, fluffy grey coat, blue eyes and white points, has been named, "Beau", by P.

My favorite is "Badger Boy" the black and white next to the building, out of Ursula.

The two browns, the far one, is Carmella's, the youngest of the bunch, not born until June. The one in the middle of the group is "Uureka's Boy" (I aggravate Boss when I call his Mom "Eureka" like the vaccuum-it is pronounced with the Scandinavian "UU". Well, maybe not Scandinavian, but we used to have a slew of "hj's..." pronounced "Yuh". Back to the buckling, I call him "Monarch Baby", after his sire, not after the dam so I don't have to sweat the "UU". :)

Besides, his father has always been the handsomest buck to me. I remember when I first met him, I thought he was so handsome, but he does not like to be touched. I have been working on him for four years now, soft and slow. We get along pretty well. I don't pet him and he doesn't horn me.

Boss is away right now, and I have taken the job of walking the bucks. Yesterday they hit the third field and the snowmobile trail and kept going and going and going. I couldn't cut them off and had no idea where we would end up. I have heard stories of them ending up the next town over once....and I thought it was to be repeated yesterday.

Desperate, I pulled my Pb&j out of my bag and started waving it. No stopping them. I did have a couple of apples in there, I should have tossed one into the group but didn't think of it.

Finally they stopped and I stopped so not to spook them and rolled a smoke. Then I discovered I didn't have a light and that did it-I snuck by them and chased them back up the trail.

When we finally reached the third field, R was there and I was surprised he had followed us that far, since he had never been back that far. Most of the bucks followed him, but poor old Monarch couldn't keep up so I stayed with him. I had heard coyotes yipping on the way in-and Monarch has a pathetic little cry when he gets left behind so I didn't want to leave him for coyote fodder.

Crossing the first field just the two of us, I imagined him as a little buckling racing and leaping along, now a senior hobbling along way behind. It nearly brought tears to my eyes. I reached into my bag and hauled out one of the wild apples and gave it to him.

Then I discovered he can't walk and eat an apple. So I took a couple of pics.

BLF Rayvon's Monarch

Friday

Well, it's been a busy day! Should I add that it started off with more regurgitated cat food on the stairs on my way to coffee? Jingle has just got to stop eating mice-they are obviously not agreeing with her.

Busy at the farm. Ironically, my border photo of the farm shows Pablo in the fore-Boss took him for combing herself, as she is separating his fiber white from coloured. Fine with me-I tend to comb all over and am rather careless about separating, besides, I had my hands full.

Nasrim again, and I had Willow on Carlos, the caramel wether second near in the photo. Willow raved about how sweet he was, and then wandered off to admire the babies. Still only five romping about. Bonnie tried to get Boss when Boss climbed into her pen to wash her hooves after yesterday's trim-once Bonnie realized Boss had no interest in her baby (Willow's favorite), she settled down.

So, I moved over to take over Carlos, and managed to tease out a bit of cashmere clumped on his neck. Barbaranna, one of my favorite does, third back in the pic, was waiting for Boss to do her hooves, keeping us company in the box stall.

When she went, I released Carlos, and moved on to Clarke, a big fat white wether with long guard hair. Willow has nicknamed him, "The Cornmaster". He is reknown for breaking into the grain room and nearly stuffing himself into a coma.

His rear is totally matted dreadlocks, and I have been working him for two days trying to get the cashmere off his neck and midline, and alternating slickers full of guard hair off the mats. Still not done.

Then we moved onto the buckling hill with P, and she took on Rue, and I took on Bibbles. Yeah, we have missed the sun; by 10am it is picking up strength and two days of it is giving my face a bit of a glow.

Then I met the crew over at the big bucks, and took on Mauro. I set Willow up with Zeuss, after trying to help the boys find a short in the electric fence. Boss hadn't asked me to look, and since I was there to comb I left them to it .

Chriss started giving Boss a hard time while she was working on Zeuss's hooves, so I collared him and was bringing him through the fence while Willow had taken on Mauro. Then something happened. I missed it, but it involved Willow getting dumped off the five gallon bucket she was sitting on. I am not sure if he tried to butt her or just jumped and bumped her off. I think she was covering for him,(since I couldn't get a clear story) but thankfully she was unhurt except for her pride.

Boss took over combing Chrissie, and I sent Willow off to the farm pond to check out the croaking frogs. I was still on Mauro. Once or twice I cleaned my slicker and reached over and swiped gobs of cashmere off of Chrissie's neck when he had his head back showing Boss where to comb with his horns. It was funny watching him pause in mid scratch while I swiped his neck. He was in Nirvana. LOL.

Then the hounds next door discovered Willow at the pond, and startled her, so back she rushed through the swamp, filling her boots with water. TG it was time to call it a day.

Back home I spread some well rotted manure on the "lawn". We played some soccer with Peko in the driveway, and it was easy to see what happened to the lawn last fall. In no time the drive was churned up into loose dirt. When I have the drive fixed, I think I will just have them dump a load of gravel at the end and throw Peko's ball on top. It will be spread out in no time.

We took the goats for a walk in the woods. They were astonished when I dropped the gate and stepped back. They rushed out and started gobbling all the little bits on the ground, and then moved on to toppling small firs, and finally started walking and nibbling only the select bits. Once we reached the marsh, they bolted back up the hill to the goose grain, much to the chagrin of the goose, who latched onto Moonie, honking and flapping.

Then the goats moved on to the grain sludge the Firebird has been dumping out of the goose water all winter, and that was enough for me. I put the goats back in.

A huge pizza and half gallon of ice cream for dinner-I took beer instead of the ice cream-hey, it's Friday, what the heck...

I type this praying for rain to move in before morning-Boss wants us back tomorrow if the weather is good, but I want the weekend off. The weather looks great for all next week, so there will be plenty of time for combing then. Still, if the sun rises in the morning, I may go for some more combing. C'mon rain. (did I really say that????)

goat talk

We wormed all our goats yesterday morning. I was not sure what they weighed, so I took the scale out and pre-weighed the Firebird and myself, expecting that we would pick up the goat and then subtract our weights. We started with skittish little Anna, the youngest, who had never been wormed. Of course her eyelids were bright red, indicating that she was not anemic, but I was going to worm them all anyhow.

Anna's response to people is to play passive. She curled up on the ground and glued herself there. The Firebird couldn't budge her. Talk about dead weight! I managed to get her in my arms, and then couldn't get to standing, so I had the Firebird help me lift her. She weighed 65 pounds!

Then Derek was on the small house roof, so I scooped him up, he being the next smallest, and he weighed nearly a hundred. Combined with my weight of currently 137,
(my Doc would be dancing with glee), we nearly topped the scale, so I stopped weighing goats and started guesstimating. Phew, got that job done!

Today we worked at the farm. The day did not start well at home, beginning with cat vomit on my favorite rug (I refer to these as omens of a "cat puke day") and sure enough, things were helter skelter at the farm. We ended up on the buckling hill for two hours combing the little guys. The first ones were easy enough-then I had saved Jacolby for last.

The other time I combed him, he yelled so hard I had to release him. So of course today he started in yelling. I started singing to him..."Mr. Pitiful". This caused him to increase the tempo of his screaming. Maybe he was just trying to drown me out. Finally he settled down enough to comb quietly. Phew, my arms arm aching, and I already agreed to comb the big bucks tomorrow. Ha. I think I am ready for a nap.... :P

farmtalk

Cashmere combing season

The Farm Boss followed up an earlier e-mail with a phone call this week about combing. Clever lady, she called when the power was out and I was unable to screen my calls. Ha.

The saplings and I had already discussed what the modus operandi would be if I should have to go back to the farm. But I told Boss when she called that I would have to discuss it with them and would call her back later that day. The saplings were gung ho with the plan-it was myself who had reservations, so I delayed calling Boss back until this am. Today was to be the warmest of the week, and I told myself if I awoke without the alarm clock I would ring her at 7.

Dang my internal clock! I awoke bright and early, and rolled over and caught another hour of sleep-still plenty of time to ring her-so I did and agreed to work this am.

Since I am homeschooling this year, Boss offerred both kids could come with me, but we had agreed that the Firebird would stay home working on schoolwork, and the Willow would come with me. The Firebird is the strong man on chores, but doesn't comb. Willow is fully versed on animal talk and loves to comb.

The Firebird, true to his middle name, is also a nightowl, so I expected him to sleep in as usual. Nope, he rolled downstairs just as I was finishing our own goat chores and was readying to leave.

That saved leaving a note, so I gave him instructions and the Willow and I headed out. Four dirt roads and two stretches of tar, and we arrived at the farm. The old Great Pyranees, Balloo, came right up to me wagging his tail, and the ancient wether, Ali Goatee, right behind. Much to Ali Goatee's delight, I gave him the last bit of raisin bread toast I had in my hand. He wasn't letting me out of his sight for the next two hours!

Willow tucked right in on combing with me on Sugreca. I thought we would start with the worst, since Sugreca was a nightmare for me last year, climbing the walls on her chain, and P told me that she was bad for the boys already this year. Willow pre-empted me, and went up to Sugreca and spoke softly and caressed her cheeks, and that goat was very easy to comb!

After a bit, we gave Sugreca a break and I picked one of two yearlings, Buffy's girl, Bella. I thought she would be wild, and again Willow wove her magic to such a degree that I left her solo with Bella and went back to work on Sugreca.

Willow worked right along, and eventually Boss moved in with Lois from the next stall. Willow couldn't wait to show Boss how much cashmere she had combed off Bella and Boss checked it out. Willow later confided in me that she thought Boss was pleased how nicely combed the cashmere was, and not all balled up. We have been working on her technique at home.

There was a couple of hay deliveries, and I released Sugreca and started in on Beatrice. Willow hunted down her lunchbag with her hot cocoa out of the tack room, and then was promptly confronted by the pig, Laverne, in the aisleway. Well, that was pretty funny, I guess. Laverne is a really rare breed of pig-Boss couldn't find her a replacement mate-she is old and black colored. I used to give her treats like leftover sandwich crusts.

Well, Laverne stood in front of Willow sniffing that lunchpack and Willow's pockets and was snorting and gurgling...(actually I wondered if she might eat Willow-hahaha) Finally, Willow made her way byLaverne and into our stall and then Ali Goatee thought hot cocoa sounded good...so Willow went back to the tack room with the Old farm dog and a farm cat for company.

Boss and I caught up with who was gone-Uud, Sheba, Daisy-old does recently gone to slaughter, and all old friends to me. Bucks-Gingerman found dead a few months ago, Nishak gone to slaughter, Hjalmar off for breeding.

Boss did have a buck lined up for combing-Mauro. So we headed over to Prescott and I had a chance to see my old buck friends. Some seemed to remember me. Leif, Chrissie, of course, Duke, Prince. Chrissie took such a shine to Willow he kept rubbing his face on her stomach while she kept her hands firmaly in her pockets. LOL. Bucks have an ODOR.

I give in and give them neck and cheek scratches. Awww.

Willow and I helped clean, and I helped collar, and then Willow helped put all their dishes out-feeding time at the zoo-what kid wouldn't want to help? Then, she helped pick up all the dishes, calling all the bucks by name already. I think R was glad of the help today.

Willow did complain a bit at the end-Boss referred to it today as the "bitter end" with the bucks being last on the list, and we were late getting there. Willow said Mauro was being difficult and she had to hold his head to comb behind his horns. What she didn't realize is that he was being good for a buck! Sometimes one person has to jam one of their horns into the fence and then hang onto their head and the second person combs or does hooves...

Right at the end, R came up to watch and Mauro butted him hard right in the kneecap! I guess he had to take it out on someone!!

All in all we had a fun morning. I was paid very well, with the expectation that I will tip Willow out for her terrific assistence. We all need the cash (she is saving for a new bike) so hopefully we will have a few more mornings of work ahead of us.

This week the weather just didn't cooperate for combing at the farm. I spent one late morning combing my own goats this week, when the sun had warmed things up enough to work without gloves.

The temps were supposed to be in the 40's today, so Boss agreed for Willow and I to go in to comb. Two nights this week I have slept poorly, waking up every hour on the hour after midnight. Just long enough to roll over and check the time, but still, disturbed rest. Well, last night was the second night.

So, I am exhausted! We started off with little Beatrice again, and then moved up to the bucklings on the hill. I just love the bucklings! They are so cute! We combed Ursula's boy, and then I moved in on Bonnie's boy, whom Boss was combing, but she stepped away for a minute and I took him over.

Then we came down off the hill, and still the weekend boys were not ready to go to Prescott, so we combed a wether, Carlos. He was losing guard hair, so we didn't get much cashmere off of him. I was getting hungry and tired and needed some coffee and a smoke so I chatted quite a bit with P, who had also come in to comb. I kept looking out, waiting for the cue to go to the big bucks. Finally we left after 11. :(

I thought Willow and I were going to work on Chrissie, but when we arrived, Boss said Leif looked worse. Ugh. Leif got me in the eye socket with a horn tip last year. One of his horns is broken off quite short, but the other one really sticks out there. Everytime he flipped around to that side, I put a hand on the tip of his horn so I knew where it was. That made slow combing, since I need that hand to hold up the guard hair to get the cashmere beneath.

Whent he boys were finished, I agreed to give Boss a lift back to the farm so she could hold Leif in the meantime. She hung onto his horns, but had some trouble holding him still.

We got quite a bit of nice cashmere off him in a short time. His long wirey guard hair is very sticky, so I was using a lot of force with the slicker to tease the cashmere out. And after working on two bucklings, my arms are tired!!!

We found out today that Ali Goatee was put down this week! :(( He was quite old and Boss found him down back unable to rise, and had one of the boys father's come over and shoot him. Willow was near tears at the news. We enjoyed hanging out with Ali Goatee last week.

The sun is really melting a lot of snow out there right now. I should be out combing my own goats, but I am wiped! Peko is sleeping on my bed in the sun, and I think I might join him for a siesta.